To celebrate Geography Awareness Week, The University of Alabama Department of Geography sponsored a Geocache Challenge organized by Club Geography. Students were able to organized teams of up to four members to find various points around the UA campus. Highlighting the Geography Awareness Week theme of Civil Rights, many points related to the impact of the Civil Rights Movement at The University of Alabama such as Malone Hood Plaza, which commemorates James Hood and Vivian Malone, who were the first two African American students to enroll at the university. More information about points from the Tuscaloosa Civil Rights Trail can be found online. Beyond the theme of Civil Rights, other points related to the department and its history, such as a geocache at the Bus Depot, which highlights the role of transportation geography and some of the courses offered by faculty in this sub-discipline.
As part of the department’s GIS Day Symposium, prizes were handed out to teams that completed the Geocache Challenge. Prizes were awarded to the three teams that found all 15 points in the shortest amount of time, and a prize was award to the team that did the most on social media during the event using “#GYGeocache.” A total of 19 teams and almost 50 people participated in the event.
First place: The Code Breakers (Dinuke Munasinghe, Miriam Khanam, Md. Tazmul Islam, and Julia Zimmerman) – Completed in 1 hour, 26 minutes
Second place: The Board of Education (Luke Barnhart and Jackson Kerchis) – Completed in 1 hour, 44 minutes
Third place: Cache me Ousside (James Misfeldt and Matthew Daly) – Completed in 1 hour, 56 minutes
Social media prize: The BadgerMoles (Anna Pitts, Henry Pitts, Lauren Iosue, and Alaina Makowski)